234 articles from FRIDAY 20.11.2020
After more than a decade, ChIP-seq may be quantitative after all
For more than a decade, scientists studying epigenetics have used a powerful method called ChIP-seq to map changes in proteins and other critical regulatory factors across the genome. While ChIP-seq provides invaluable insights into the underpinnings of health and disease, it also faces a frustrating challenge: its results are often viewed as qualitative rather than quantitative, making...
Study: Countering hate on social media
The rise of online hate speech is a disturbing, growing trend in countries around the world, with serious psychological consequences and the potential to impact, and even contribute to, real-world violence. Citizen-generated counter speech may help discourage hateful online rhetoric, but it has been difficult to quantify and study. Until recently, studies have been limited to small-scale,...
States unfairly burdening incarcerated people with 'pay-to-stay' fees
Pay-to-stay, the practice of charging people to pay for their own jail or prison confinement, is being enforced unfairly by using criminal, civil and administrative law, according to a new Rutgers University-New Brunswick led study.
Zebra finches amazing at unmasking the bird behind the song
If songbirds could appear on "The Masked Singer" reality TV competition, zebra finches would likely steal the show. That's because they can rapidly memorize the signature sounds of at least 50 different members of their flock, according to new research from the University of California, Berkeley.
Science reveals secrets of a mummy's portrait
How much information can you get from a speck of purple pigment, no bigger than the diameter of a hair, plucked from an Egyptian portrait that's nearly 2,000 years old? Plenty, according to a new study. Analysis of that speck can teach us about how the pigment was made, what it's made of—and maybe even a little about the people who made it. The study is published in the International Journal of...
Canadian technological ingenuity and astronaut talent has been our ticket to space
New book tells the tale of Canada’s involvement in international space exploration, and how the Canadarm became 'Canada's space...
Microbes may be our miners on asteroids, moons and other planets
Microbes could be put to use in future human space settlements extracting metals and rare elements from rocks, according to a researcher who designed the world's first mining experiment in...
Cruel to be kind: New citizen patrols will scare Edmonton coyotes with sticks and tennis balls
Volunteers armed with tennis balls, sticks and cans filled with coins will be a new kind of soldier in the conservation battle to keep Alberta’s urban coyotes...
Donegal: Ministers shocked at peat slide devastation
Ministers visited the scene of a huge peat slide on the Tyrone Donegal border.